The device of the present invention relates in general to a vibratory apparatus and more particularly to a vibratory apparatus in the form of a jogging device for jogging sheets of paper or the like into an aligned stack.
In general, the jogger of the present invention may be used in combination with any suitable source of sheet material supply and it finds special utility in the field of stacking paper as received from such devices as web cutters or printing presses and the like.
With the web cutters and sheeters disclosed in some of the prior art, the cut sheets were not stacked directly onto a shipping skid, but were cut to oversized dimensions and later guillotine trimmed to the desired size. This method was necessary because the web cutters were not capable of making precise cuts and because the sheets were generally finally stacked on shipping skids, which were larger all around than the sheets, to prevent damage from the stack binding operation. However, along with the development of new high speed precision sheeters, particularly those disclosed in applicant's prior U.S. Pat. No. 3,203,326; 3,222,964; 3,272,044 and 3,363,520, including other related patents, it became obvious that the need was great for a jogging device for stacking machine finished paper directly onto its shipping skid.
While investigating the need for a useful jogging device, the applicant herein developed the high speed jogger disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,062,539. The jogger of that invention gave the necessary precision for jogging, but it was use-limited since it was not adaptable for starting the stack of cut sheets on their own shipping skid. To overcome some of the problems inherent in the use of the jogger of U.S. Pat. No. 3,062,539, the applicant herein later on developed the floating jogger device disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,733,070. However, that jogger also proved to be not completely successful since its pivoted paddle was not able to give good jogging action for the first few sheets coming onto the skid. Accordingly, the jogger of the present invention was developed to overcome the slight disadvantages of the previously described joggers while retaining all of their desirable features.